A generic action movie with a generic title, Customs Frontline fails to build any genuine tension with its confused story of international intrigue, revenge, and overcoming mental illness. Kudos to prolific Chinese action director Herman Yau and writer Erica Li (who penned Yau’s Shock Wave films) for trying to imbue this with some character depth to go along with all the fights and shootouts, but these nobler efforts can’t provide enough steam to power a project that’s equal parts dull and overstuffed.
As one could guess from the title, the story unfolds in the world of customs officers stationed at the port of Hong Kong. They spend most of their days patrolling the waters in and around the city, stopping boats, performing background checks, and examining shipments. One fateful day, Ports and Maritimes officer Chow Chiang-lai (Nicholas Tse) and his co-workers stumble upon an unmarked vessel where the crew has been massacred. The boat in question was carrying a large cache of weapons and a valuable compass that’s used to pilot submarines bound for an African nation at war. The seizure of the cargo raises the ire of its shipper, the nefarious Dr. Raw (Amanda Strang), who will stop at nothing to get it back. An uneasy joint task force between Customs and the Ports and Maritimes department is struck, but after violence escalates and costs the lives of several government workers, Chow becomes more determined than ever to bring the gunrunners to justice, despite the objections of his superiors.
Customs Frontline gets off to an okay start, but never rises above a basic level of cinematic craft and competency, something hindered by the story’s constant stop/start structure and a reliance on awful and unconvincing CGI (particularly during a Fast Five styled heist attempt on a shipping container that goes awry). Customs Frontline has three major plans of attack and none of them are working because of their constant fight for attention. It wants to be a maximalist action picture, but there aren’t enough inventive and original moments for it to stand out on that level before the final act, by which time it’s too late to right the ship. It wants to be a character drama where everyone has complex motivations that drive them, but there’s entirely too much going on for the flimsy narrative to handle all the ambition. And it wants to be a tale of geopolitical intrigue where the hero has to find a mole within the organization, but the story beats are too hokey and unbelievable to be taken seriously. There are many moments when Customs Frontline shows potential, but just as things start to look up, Li’s script trips over itself time and time again.
Chow isn’t an interesting hero outside of his drive and determination, but the side characters have enough personality traits to fill several movies. Chow’s mentor and superior officer, Cheung (played by Jackie Cheung, in the film’s best performance) suffers from poorly treated bipolar disorder, leading to moments of rage, sadness, and disassociation. Cheung’s supportive partner, Athena (Karena Lam), is a high ranking Customs agent brought in to work the case, and frequently finds her professional and personal loyalties divided. Chow and Cheung constantly have to contend with high ranking official Kwok (Francise Ng, whose talents are somewhat wasted here), a stuffed-shirt, by-the-book type who thinks everyone on the task force is potentially corrupted. Even the film’s cartoonish and garish villain has a moment where they get to over-explain their motivations. Customs Frontline is never content with leaving well enough alone, and while the desire to add some meat to the story’s bones is admirable, none of this is done in a way that allows viewers to connect with anyone other than Cheung’s conflicted officer.
Yau has been working regularly in the Hong Kong action industry since the early 90s, and he’s a fine filmmaker when given the proper material and resources. Just a few weeks ago, Yau oversaw the release of a much better – although equally generic sounding – action film called Crisis Negotiators, which came and went without much fanfare in North America, despite being a near shot for shot remake of the 1998 American thriller The Negotiator. Although that project was a bit of a chip shot, it was a lot more fun than this. The material was strong from the start, and it showcased what Yau could do with a better starting point. Customs Frontline, on the other hand, feels like a rushed piece of wafer thin jingoism that can’t figure out what it wants to be, and not enough money has been pumped into the project to at least make it look convincing. It looks and moves every bit like a project that was rushed into production so the producers didn’t lose their cast to other, potentially better jobs.
The action is hit or miss, and some of Yau’s large scale shootouts aren’t that interesting to sit through, but whenever Customs Frontline stages car stunts (particularly a stunning tunnel chase) or practical stunt work and hand-to-hand combat (nicely choreographed by star Tse, in an assured first venture into such territory), things pick up a little bit. But with a bloated and exhausting run time pushing things uncomfortably to the two hour mark, getting to those beats is a bit of a patience test. Had this been a smarter film that had a better handle on the complexity of the issues at hand or a dumber film about someone on a mission to take out some villains because they made things personal, Customs Frontline would’ve been something. Instead, it’s not much of anything.
Customs Frontline is now playing in select cities.
